With the goal of helping students with special needs build their skills by taking them to work environments, the STARR program continues to improve their program since it began in 2014.
For STARR transition teacher Renee Wagner, she has seen a lot of progress during her time with the program.
“I can’t even tell you how many students we’ve had employed, because the work sites get to know the kids and understand that they know to keep their phones away,” Wagner said. “They know to follow directions.”
Some of these tasks can vary from location to location and require transportation, while some can have the students help out around the school.
According to Wagner, a big area of work is the school cafeteria, more specifically, lunch preparation for the school day.
“So in our high school cafeteria, we do all the boats for Taco Tuesday, the big day, they roll the cookies, they put the fries out on trays so that they can throw them in,” Wagner said.
According to Broad Theater assistant manager Tina Weaver, the students are always willing to help out at the Broad Theater whenever they take the time to visit the location.
“So whenever I need anything extra, like vacuuming out the back hallway or sweeping up some leafs in the back alleyway, anything extra,” Weaver said, “they’re always willing to help out and do something different rather than just wiping the theaters down.”
Weaver mentions that the STARR program and the Broad Theater collaborated back in 2022 when the program introduced itself to her.
“We think it’s fantastic. It’s great to see the staff here. 
Well, the crew that comes, I love to see them. There’s all sorts of different personalities,” Weaver said.
For Wagner, her motivation to wake up and come into the building every morning with the students is because of the “growth and progress” that is displayed every day in class.
“In special ed, you don’t get to see a lot of progress sometimes, and here we do see progress,” Wagner said. “We see, they’re working on two or three goals, and they’re starting to meet those goals.”
For Care and Share volunteer manager Suzanne Kratz, supporting the STARR program comes from personal experience and growing up with a disability.
“Growing up with that disability, I was always behind, I was always teased and bullied,
 and my passion is to be able to support people, to give them that launching pad,” Kratz said. “If you can create a space for individuals to be here and have that freedom of being able to learn how to excel, to boost that confidence, and have purpose? Why wouldn’t we.”
Care and Share production manager Dawn Eberly feels that her struggles with addiction help her view the STARR program as her way of “paying it forward” when the students visit Care and Share.
“[Care and Share] gave me a job. They gave me a new way. They gave me confidence. They believed in me,” Eberly said. “Working here is very special to me, because not only is our cause good, we get to interact with everyone, disabled or not, and I can give back. I can pay it forward.”
According to Eberly, the whole idea of Care and Share helping the STARR program comes from finding.
“So, our goal here is always to be able to have a place for people to belong, jobs and abilities that can coincide, the ability to be able to learn new skills that can help them post high school, with all of those things that they can learn,” Eberly said.